Ember Coal Fire Pizza — Restaurant in Harwich

I have never written a review before but my experience at Ember was so appalling that I feel obligated to write one. The first red flag presented itself when I sat down at the table and my hand landed in a slimy substance. You would hope a restaurant would thoroughly clean each table between customers, but I guess not. We then ordered drinks. My cousin ordered a Manhattan, and I ordered a “Top Shelf Old Fashioned” (it’s just called that on the menu.) The drinks tasted as if the bartender had never made a cocktail before. There was zero sweetness to them, so I had to squeeze out every bit of juice from my orange wedge just to balance the drink somewhat. My cousin’s Manhattan was basically straight bourbon in a martini glass, so he ordered an additional lemonade with which to mix it. I have consumed less-than-stellar drinks before and hoped the rest of the meal would be better. I was wrong.

Once our server returned, we ordered wings and nachos for our appetizers. We’ve had their wings before, which are actually pretty good (credit where it’s due), but I could have made better nachos with three ingredients and my microwave. The cheese was not layered whatsoever and there were about four beans localized to one corner of the tray. The salsa, sour cream, and guacamole were presented alongside the chips in their own individual plastic containers, so the $14 “nachos” were basically chips, one thin layer of melted cheese, four beans, and a few pieces of sliced jalapeño. We considered sending the chips back but were so hungry that we ate them anyway.

Now for the coup de grâce: the pizzas. We ordered a custom veggie pizza with pesto, mozzarella, onions, mushrooms, and arugula as well as a pizza from the menu with sausage and broccoli rabe. The veggie pizza came out first, and we immediately noticed it was undercooked. The bottom had no char on it, which is surprising considering the restaurant advertises its 1,000-degree pizza oven. We kindly asked our server to tell the cook to put it back in the oven, which she had no problem doing. Our server then brought back the improved veggie pizza (though they had forgotten to include the arugula) plus the sausage pizza, which was piled high with minced sausage and broccoli rabe stems. You would think that since we asked for the veggie pizza to spend more time in the oven that the sausage pizza would be cooked more thoroughly, but you would be wrong. Since there was so much minced sausage and rabe on the pizza (the opposite problem the nachos had, ironically), we could not tell it was underdone. The sausage pizza was not only undercooked but had a palpable chemical taste. When I asked one of my other cousins who was eating something else to try it, he wanted to spit it out and remarked that it tasted like paint. At this point, we just wanted to leave the restaurant so we asked for the check.

The first issue we noticed on the check was that it included a “Delivery Fee.” Seeing as though we were eating 20 feet away from the kitchen and were already unhappy with the meal, one of us got up to ask what this fee is about. One of the employees told us this was an additional fee the restaurant imposes upon their customers when they pay with a credit card, which, of course, they did not tell us about before paying. Additionally, they had charged us for the arugula on the veggie pizza even though it wasn’t included on it. Since the restaurant had already run my credit card, we decided it was too late to complain about this relatively minor detail, and we stood up and left.

Last but not least, I began to experience a piercing stomach ache immediately when I got home. I am certain it was due to the paint-flavored sausage pizza that I suspect was not cooked to temperature. In the end, we paid over $200 for slimy garlic butter hands, insultingly bad nachos, decent wings, and...

We had our wedding after party here and I can say it was one of the most stressful parts of our weekend. Communication with the manager leading up to the party was terrible for 10 months and he was hard to get a hold of or to get a straight answer from. We met with him over the summer at a time we both agreed on and from the look on his face he totally forgot that we were even supposed to meet. Regardless, he did do a walk through of the patio with us and after the meeting I was thinking we were in a better place because I was concerned about the number of people we had interested in coming (130). He said that it would be no problem.

Fast forward to the week of the wedding and I sent him the pizzas we wanted to have (after trying to get a hold of him multiple times to know when he needed this info by) to make sure they had ingredients and were prepared. And that we would like one of each to start to roll out at 6 when the party started and then we would continue to order more throughout the night. Again he said no problem. I also asked him what the rain plan was multiple times because it was in the forecast and all he said was that the weather looked great (it did end up raining halfway through).

The night of the party, we arrive with multiple buses full of people ready to eat pizza and drink. They had one bar tender outside and one inside, no pizzas in site. Once we spoke to the bar tender inside they asked if we wanted to put our food order in (which they had from when I sent it) and it was unclear why the pizzas were not already out since that is what we discussed would happen with the manager prior (who wasn’t even the one working that night).

After a lull, pizzas did come out but so much stress and worry was added on us about taking care of the guests that we invited there. Also the bar staff did the best they could, but why they only had two bar tenders on for the whole place (which was open for dinner) and a 130 person party is beyond me. Guests who arrived before me said that the hostess seemed to have no idea when they said they were there for a wedding party upon arrival and guests had to bus tables of people who had already left from dinner so that we could have some seats.

Sad it went this way— we’ve been to ember multiple times over the years and have always had a good time, which is why I picked the spot and was really looking forward to being able to celebrate there. But unfortunately did not go as planned. We are lucky to be surrounded by friends and family who didn’t seem to mind waiting around for service at that point. Organized brides beware, go somewhere with better customer service who understands and cares what a big undertaking planning...

We are DONE with trying to accommodate this restaurant. After horrible food and service several years ago, I recently purchased a daily deal for Ember and thought we'd give it another chance. We went in at 5:00, midweek in October, to a light crowd and what was clearly lining up to be a quiet night. My companion and I requested a booth, to which the hostess quickly responded booths were only for parties of 3 or more. Interesting, because we always sat at a booth in the past - and these are NOT large booths (four average people in one of these undersized booths would be tight - I can't imagine how uncomfortable larger people would be). She then walked us into the restaurant, past all the empty booths - I believe I counted 8 - and led us to a tiny table, an arm's length from another tiny occupied table, in front of a large and boisterous party at a long table. This wasn't summer and it wasn't busy. We said forget it and walked out. I truly don't understand how this restaurant stays in business. I am guessing it is strictly location, and possibly because it's a relatively cheap meal. Which matches the cheap service I guess. And unsuspecting tourists who come in and have a bad experience will simply disappear and no one will ever know. Imagine going to dinner on a date, and getting crammed into one tight section with all the other diners who made the bad call of showing up at Ember that night - while the majority of the restaurant remains empty. In the 4 - 5 times we've been here over the years, we've had both bad food (cold sauces on hot pizza, obviously added after the fact, a memorably awful white pizza) and horrific service, and never an apology. There are plenty of good restaurants locally to choose from - we eat out a lot, and we can attest to this. You presumably eat out for a pleasurable experience, but you're not going to...